Nancy "Sunny" Bostrom, whom police briefly labeled a "person of interest" last year after her mother's mummified corpse was found seated in the living room of her Piedmont home, is running for City Council in the East Bay town.

Bostrom came to the cops' attention in February when the body of Patricia Bostrom, who had not been seen by neighbors for six years, was found in a chair in her unlocked, two-story house at Highland and Blair avenues.

Police suspect that Patricia Bostrom, who was about 82 when she was last heard from, had been dead for years.

An autopsy concluded she had died of natural causes, however, and the only crime cops came up with was the moving of a dead body. And, "we could never prove Nancy did it because she denied her mother was even dead to begin with," police Capt. John Huntsaid.

Nancy Bostrom - who regularly picked up mail at the house, planted flowers in the yard and paid the utility bills - insists she saw her mother alive just weeks before her body was discovered, and thought she had gone traveling to Southern California and Scotland.

"That was a headline-grabbing, macabre story that had everyone from all over the world contacting me," Bostrom told us.

"It sounds very disturbing, naturally," she said. But the notion that something was amiss, she added, "just isn't true."

Now, Bostrom is one of five candidates vying for three seats for the City Council on Feb. 2. She says she's ready to put her "bad year" behind her and serve the community where she has lived most of her life.

She recently showed up at City Hall to talk to police brass and various department heads about issues facing the town.

As for her agenda, well - at a recent League of Women Voters candidates forum, Bostrom called for helping seniors and for putting up "prudently designed" surveillance cameras at all the city entrances to deter crime.

Baker's dough: Tough times (again) for Oakland's Merritt Restaurant and Bakery, with taxpayers being asked to help keep the nearly 60-year-old landmark afloat.

Charles Griffisand his wife, Patricia Tyler-Griffis, who got a $162,000 bailout from the cash-strapped city back in October to pay off creditors, still don't have the money to cover their rent and payments to vendors. Now their bakery is threatened with closure.

Griffis is asking the city for a second, unspecified bailout, but admits money alone won't solve the problem.

He says the real issue is a shortage of parking since the Lucky's grocery store next door expanded. And Griffis thinks the city, which signed off on the expansion, has the responsibility to help him fix the problem.

The city hired a San Francisco consultant, at a cost of $14,500, to determine if the business is still viable. A City Council committee is scheduled to review the findings Feb. 18.

From the sound of things, the bakery couple have a sympathetic ear with Councilman Larry Reid, who told us: "This is a business with a lot of employees, and to have an institution like the Merritt Bakery close wouldn't look good."

Reading tea leaves: Former San Francisco SupervisorMichael Yaki, a onetime aide to now-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, has resurfaced at City Hall in recent weeks as a lobbyist for downtown retailer Barneys. But maybe he has more on his mind.

In a new posting on Facebook, Yaki said he had just moved into District 6 - that's the one where Chris Dalyis being termed out this year - and "a dozen people asked me if I was running for supervisor again."

"Seriously, you can't go home again," Yaki said. "But to say that I'm not mulling over a run for office would be a, ahem, lie."

Well, what city job is bigger than supervisor? We can think of at least one.